The Undertaking

I have done one braver thing
Than all the Worthies did ;
And yet a braver thence doth spring,
Which is, to keep that hid.

It were but madness now to impart
The skill of specular stone,
When he, which can have learn'd the art
To cut it, can find none.

So, if I now should utter this,
Others—because no more
Such stuff to work upon, there is—
Would love but as before.

But he who loveliness within
Hath found, all outward loathes,
For he who color loves, and skin,
Loves but their oldest clothes.

If, as I have, you also do
Virtue in woman see,
And dare love that, and say so too,
And forget the He and She ;

And if this love, though placèd so,
From profane men you hide,
Which will no faith on this bestow,
Or, if they do, deride ;

Then you have done a braver thing
Than all the Worthies did ;
And a braver thence will spring,
Which is, to keep that hid.

The first three stanzas are very similar to the ones found in all of Donne’s poetry. In the first stanza (1-4) the speaker uses a boasting tone to modify his insistent enthusiasm with a great deal of reserve, in this way creating a paradox. The speaker then goes on talking about his love and compares love with stone (6), and concludes that describing his love to others would be like teaching them to cut diamond (7) which due to his inexperience with both the art of cutting stone and with love he can not describe them (8). In the fourth stanza however the speaker contradicts his analogy of love being rare, because he says that who ever find love within is able to find true love (13-14). This arises the questions that love is not rare as diamond in this way contradicting stanzas two and three making them look absurd, or gives the idea that stanza four does not represent the true experience of finding love. This contradiction in the speakers argument marks the distance between the speaker and the poet. Donne created this contradiction between himself and the speaker for creating laughter and mocking what the sophisticated people knew, by showing that love is not hard to find as diamond like the sophisticated people think but it is in the hearts of all.

http://www.questia.com/googleScholar.qst;jsessionid=JsQGk2lGVF0GPbb12lTgM9Q14TcprwSKzjBZfT6TV6hDxlBnM1D9!1746175250?docId=95769258

http://faculty.goucher.edu/eng211/john_donne.htm